Oil and gas well completion tools, drilling tools, and other completion and drilling accessories required for use on a particular well are typically placed in one or more shipping containers for transportation to a well site for use on a rig or a well operation. Those items of well equipment are assembled as a group according to the specific well operation for which they are intended at the particular well site. The shipping container or containers typically used may be a metal basket of varying dimensions. Such a metal basket or container is placed on a truck, marine vessel, or other transport vehicle to be transported to a well site. At the well site, the tools are then available for use. Rather than containers, some or all of theses objects may be placed on a trailer, strapped or secured down, and then transported to a well location.
In addition, for certain wells or certain well operations, specialized items of equipment are required. This may include, but is not limited to, the certification of certain drilling and completion components and assemblies. This certification may include re-inspection of assembled components, testing of assembled components, and verification of completion of components. Certification of the materials or composition of particular components can also be an important factor. For example, if there are special pressure or gas composition conditions in a particular well, the well tools may need to be of a particular composition, or of a specified strength of steel.
Certain components or assemblies can be taken or lost from their containers while in storage or during a shipment to fulfill an order for another job. This loss can occur for a number of reasons. For example, such a loss might occur when several jobs are being loaded and equipment for one job must be shipped before the others. Problems can occur when the component that was taken from one shipping container does not get replaced. The container with missing equipment can be sent to a well site and the absence of one more item only then becomes known. In such a case, operations on the well rig must be suspended to wait on a replacement component or assemblage.
Suspension of operations of an offshore drilling or completion rig or land drilling or completion rig to wait on components can be expensive. The costs could range from ten thousand dollars per day on a land rig to over two hundred fifty thousand dollars per day for an offshore rig.
A need exists for a method of monitoring shipments of equipment and for proving for assembly of equipment upon arrival to a designated location. The present invention provides a new and improved method of monitoring shipments of equipment components during transport and storage. In particular the method can be used for monitoring shipments of equipment for use in a well operation. Information about the components of the shipment can be encoded into a Global Positioning System (GPS) apparatus, which can be a GPS chip set or a GPS device. The components, for example components for a well job, can then be assembled into one or more shipment modules or baskets.
A need exists for a method of continuous monitoring of equipment during storage, transport, and use. During transport and storage, the GPS apparatus can be continuously monitored to ensure that the equipment components are not diverted or otherwise misplaced during transport and storage.
A need exists for a method of providing an alarm when equipment arrives at the wrong location after transport. Alarms can be used with an associated tracking processor to alert a user that the equipment or components are in the wrong location. A thread protection assembly can be adapted to be mounted on a threaded connector of the component and can have the GPS apparatus contained within it or on it.
The present embodiments meet these needs.
The present embodiments are detailed below with reference to the listed Figures.